Resi Applications: Basic density
We have been working with the IML Power Drill PD400 (Resi) since 2015 undertaking application development work for New Zealand Solid Wood Innovations. While this was primarily in radiata pine, subsequent work has included plantation eucalypts working with the various industry partners and the Australian Forest Value Centre located at the University of Tasmania.
Trace processing and simple regression relationships were developed between core basic density and mean under-bark resistance values which explained between 65% and 85% of the variance in core basic density.
The stronger relationships were obtained as the spatial separation (distance and aspect) between the core sampling point and the Resi sampling point was minimised.
Resi Eucalypt trace Manjimup 2016
Automated algorithms were developed which processed the trace to extract under-bark and over-bark diameter and correct the trace baseline. As a consequence, from a single trace collected in under 20 seconds, measures of these properties as well as basic density were obtained.
This work is recently been submitted to the Australian Forest journal (Apr 2018) for publication.
Access to these trace processing algorithms has been provided on this web site (see Site Login) allowing users to upload individual Resi traces, saved as text files and download the processed values.
DBH measures were typically found to be 95-98% correlated with standard measures with minimal bias.
We are currently working to expand these applications and allow additional trace-processing options as part of an FWPA and industry funded project.